no of nights visitor can stay without benefits being affected??

wilf55

please ...does anyone know how many nights a friend can stay without it affecting my single occupancy council tax...housing benefit or income support

many thanks

ministox5

I think its three :j

Scarlett1

Apparently its none, sorry cant remember who told me, think it was the housing benefit officer who comes round once a year, not that I have anyone staying over

melt71

Why does it make a difference if they are not contributing to the household finances! If they are a guest they should be able to stay as long as you like (within reason obviously) without having your hand slapped by the council tax/HB people.

I can't claim HB or CTB but I'm glad I don't as it sounds a real pain in the bum! I have my parents visiting me sometimes for 3 or 4 days, last summer they came for a week! If I was claiming HB or CTB would this have meant that I would have lost benefits?? Madness.

singlehouseholder

you could ring your local Benefit office and check with them?? - it depends on what you mean by a, "friend."Depends where they sleep, what meals they eat, whether any chores are carried out together, who pays for groceries,it isn't just a case of saying, he/she stays 3 nights so thats ok...Its always best to check with them to find out- judging by some of the posts on here!! its sometimes best to pop a letter in the post, just informing the DWP, that you have a friend over to stay several nights a week or whatever- as there are some malicous folk out there, who may well contact the fraud dept to snitch on you. Whether you or doing wrong or right!!!Best to keep them informed of whats going on, that way, you're covering yourself.

Fran

wilf55 wrote:

please ...does anyone know how many nights a friend can stay without it affecting my single occupancy council tax...housing benefit or income support

many thanks

Your talking about 3 different organisations here so they will differ.

It depends as well what you mean by a "visitor". If it's a potential partner or a new partner then that will clearly affect all three. It's hard to get a defining figure on this I don't think I've seen it written down. If it is this situation then you would probably be all right to start of with, eg. the first 2 or 3 months, but it depends on how you are seen by neighbours and whether they've got their possessions in your place. However if they have their own place then I seem to remember that they can't be seen as living with you. Sorry not being very definite here!

If it's a friend who's temporarily staying with you again it's only when it's habit/ a prolonged period.

You'd have to inform them all seperately.

sleepy

Don't know about housing benefit or income support, but until last summer I worked in Council Tax. So long as the friend is paying council tax (or registered for it and getting council tax benefit to pay it) at a different address then they won't be classed as living with you and your single person reduction will still stand, the logic being that you can't have more than one primary address.

missk_ensington

Not sure if this has been said but I was told last year it was 2 nights (them being weekends, although it doesn't have to be used then) I think they acceot you might want a friend/boyfriend/girlfriend to stay over at weekend and this is allowed.

Fran

missk_ensington wrote:

Not sure if this has been said but I was told last year it was 2 nights (them being weekends, although it doesn't have to be used then) I think they acceot you might want a friend/boyfriend/girlfriend to stay over at weekend and this is allowed.

No it's not "2 nights", it's not as simple as that as other posters have pointed out, also as post before yours said re council tax.

missk_ensington

Perhaps not, I think the OP is asking in relation to Income support though not Council tax. The question is essentially, at what point are you defined as 'co-habiting' ?

At the end of the day, unless they camp outside your door with a camera they're never gonna know, so long as he/she isn't contributing to your household income I dont see the problem. When I was on Income Support my boyfriend stayed over varying days week to week, sometimes just one, other time 4-5 depending on how busy we were. No one even noticed, and he weren't contributing anyway

Fran

This thread has links to other threads where this has been discussed before, sorry I haven't got time to look through them for the answer! They can be found under FAQ's.